It might seem a little early to worry about skin cancer in college, as it is usually not detected until late adulthood; however, overexposure during childhood and adolescence significantly impacts the risk of skin cancer.  College-aged students need to understand that for this reason, skin protection is vital in reducing the risk of future skin cancer.
Invisible ultraviolet rays are the culprit when it comes to skin cancer.  UV rays include both UVA and UVB rays, those most commonly related to skin cancer. The most obvious sign of skin damage includes a deep reddening of the skin, or sunburn; however, suntans are another sign — they develop after the sun’s rays kill some cells and damage others. UV rays cause skin damage during any season or at any temperature; for this reason, skin protection is important not only during the warmer, sunnier months.
The necessity of skin protection applies to both sunlight and artificial UV rays, such as those found in tanning beds. Tanning is the body’s natural defense mechanism to prevent further UV radiation damage; skin cells produce brown pigment to protect from additional UV exposure. College-aged students need to understand that sunburn is not the only sign of skin damage; skin protection is necessary even if one tans easily.
Dr. Amy Alson of the Charlottesville Free Clinic said there are two basic classes of skin cancer: non-melanoma, which includes squamous cell and basal cell cancers, and melanoma. The difference between them is not only in appearance, but also in the risk factors.  According to the MedlinePlus Web site, skin cancer is the most common form of cancer in the United States, non-melanoma being the most common types.The following question-and-answer session was conducted with Dr. Alson about the different types of skin cancers.

What are the differences between the non-melanoma and melanoma skin cancers?

Non-melanoma invades the skin tissue and can be disfiguring. Also, non-melanoma is less likely to spread [than] melanoma. Melanoma tends to be much more serious and causes the most death related to skin cancer.

What causes skin cancer?

All skin cancer is caused by overexposure to UVA and UVB rays. Melanoma and basal cell is usually caused by intermittent exposure in childhood and adolescence, while squamous is more likely to occur from chronic exposure. Another risk factor for non-melanoma skin cancer is smoking. Although melanoma only accounts for 4 percent of all cancer, melanoma is responsible for 77 percent of skin cancer deaths.

What are the symptoms of skin cancer?

The most common symptom of skin cancer is a visible skin lesion. That may be new or an already existing one that has changed. Melanoma skin cancer is usually indicated by irregular change in a mole; this may include changing borders or bleeding. On the other hand, basal cell may resemble a scab that keeps coming back, while squamous usually includes a scaly lesion.
If someone believes that he/she has a mole that appears disfigured, scaly or perhaps bleeding, he/she should visit a doctor. Because skin cancer does not always show up in visible places such as the face, it is important to routinely check the entire body, such as the legs, back and arms.

What are the ways to prevent skin cancer?

Because overexposure during childhood and adolescence is one of the number-one risk factors regarding skin cancer, it is important for college-aged students to utilize skin protection — this includes both sunscreen of a SPF 15 or higher and sun-protective clothing. SPF is a measure of protection against UVB rays; for this reason, people should use products that include ingredients such as zinc oxide to protect against harmful UVA rays.

What treatment is available?

Usually, melanoma is treated through surgical means. Basal cell skin cancer is treated most commonly through Mohs surgery, which consists of microscopic removal incrementally — the tissue is removed piece by piece to prevent scarring and damage. Squamous skin cancer is treated through topical medicine. For both melanoma and non-melanoma, biopsies are taken to determine whether or not the skin tissue is cancerous.   

How common is skin cancer?

Skin cancer is more common in older men past the age of 45. Also, Caucasians are more likely to be diagnosed skin cancer. One out of 55 men will have melanoma skin cancer during a lifetime, while one out of 82 females will.

Further, what precautions should college students take?

College-aged people should ensure to use skin protection at all times. Because college students are outside a lot, sunscreen should be used, as well as sun-protective clothing. This includes walking to class, football games, etc.

As part of its University Unity Project, Student Council aims to convince the University to delay its on-Grounds housing deadline and to push for a city ordinance creating a later lease-signing date. Its emphasis, however, is on encouraging students to act in their own collective interest by waiting until later in the year to sign leases. Barring some change in policy, this campaign has little chance of succeeding.
Early lease deadlines is a real problem — one worthy of Council’s attention. First-year students typically have to sign leases with people they don’t really know, often resulting in miserable second-year living situations. The rush to find an apartment means plenty of upperclassmen, as well, end up in less-than-ideal housing.
But a noble goal is only as good as the plan to reach it. Council’s lobbying for policy changes is worthwhile, but its attempt to change the behavior of several thousand students is a little naive.
Models for successful city ordinances dealing with this problem exist — Council President Matt Schrimper pointed to an Ann Arbor, Mich., law that forbids a landlord to sign a lease with a new tenant less than 90 days after the current tenant’s lease has begun. The city ordinance must be careful to separate clearly the student housing market and the rest of the Charlottesville housing market. Singling out leases with long delays between their signing date and their move-in date should do the trick.
A city ordinance will be hard to come by, especially since, as Schrimper noted, the law’s uniqueness means approval from Richmond would be needed. The City of Charlottesville has bigger problems to deal with than students with houses they don’t like: people without homes, for example.
The root of the problem, in fact, probably lies with the University’s policies. Many first-year students try their luck in the University’s housing lottery before looking off Grounds for housing. The University even moved its signing date forward this year in an attempt to compete with local landlords.
This is why an attempt to change the status quo without a city ordinance is likely doomed. Competition in the housing market has driven landlords to offer leases earlier and driven students to sign them.
The problem with getting students to change their behavior is they are caught in a classic prisoner’s dilemma. Everyone could gain if everyone signed leases later. But if everyone signed leases later, every individual could try to gain advantage by signing early. And if most people continue to sign early, those who wait are at a disadvantage. Unless everyone can trust everyone else to sign leases later, they have no incentive to do so. No matter how many flyers Council prints out, this behavior will not change.
The problem with Council’s reliance on education is it assumes Council’s voice is loud enough to reach all students. A quick poll of University students will probably reveal they are not even aware of the Unity Project yet. Council would have to try very hard indeed to disseminate the details of the project as well.

EXACTLY 45 years after Martin Luther King’s visionary “I Have a Dream” speech, a feverish crowd of 80,000 packed itself like sardines into the feisty atmosphere of Invesco Stadium in Denver, waiting to hear nothing less than its sequel. So the stage was set for yet another energetic, transformative and inspirational speech by Barack Obama as he accepted the Democratic nomination.
But alas, Obama sounded more like a normal politician than a prophet on a night where people were expecting divine revelation. It lacked the sort of thrill that usually races up Chris Matthews’s leg. Fanatical youths waved “change we can believe in” signs even as the speech had abandoned the dreamy mantra in favor of the more corporeal “the change that we need.” Transcendental sermons about race and reinvigorating the innovative American spirit were shelved in favor of a programmatic list of problems and solutions that invited textual comparisons by political pundits to a wooden Al Gore address. And the colorful theme of uniting Red and Blue America from his defining 2004 Boston convention speech was relegated to a mere paragraph or two about unity on abortion, gun control, same sex marriage and immigration.
The address itself as a whole was less a stirring call to arms than it was a well-delivered checklist of doubts he needed to squelch about his candidacy. Are my airy goals too vague for you? Let me “spell out exactly what that change would mean” on everything from Social Security and healthcare to outsourcing and the economy for most of my speech. Concerned I don’t attack McCain enough? Here’s my most direct attack on how he’s Bush’s third term. Think I’m a celebrity like Paris Hilton? Let me tell you my American story. And are you anxious about my inexperience on foreign policy issues? Well, I’ve been right before and “I look forward to debating them with John McCain.”
In that “American Promise” speech, Obama underwent what Max Weber famously labeled the “routinization of charisma” and former Bush speechwriter Michael Gerson calls “the Obama transformation”. He went from a man embodying a different brand of politics to a parrot of trite democratic bread and butter arguments like demonizing big corporations and decrying outsourcing. He morphed from a flag-bearer of post-partisanship to another tiresome critic of the Bush policies. In short, he flipped from a unique candidate pledging to transform politics to yet another naïve youth who was transformed by politics.
Idealistic youths flocking to see a sellout rock-star concert were understandably disappointed when they heard the same old broken record of policy proposals they had read on his campaign Web site. But anyone looking beyond the normal but well-delivered speech understands that this was a shift that Obama had to make. August witnessed the stirrings of what The Economist rightly labeled “Obama fatigue”. Pew Research Center polls in August revealed that Americans had heard too much about Barack Obama but knew too little about his policy positions. The McCain campaign painted him as a self-absorbed Paris Hilton, far too elitist to address America’s problems beyond saying “yes we can.” His wavering on the Russian incursion into Georgia raised eyebrows about his ‘judgment,’ while rumblings that Clinton voters would either sit the election out or defect raised doubts about party unity. Before the Democratic Convention began last week, polls either showed Obama’s lead over McCain withering or McCain surging to the lead.   
Under those conditions, it is understandable, even commendable, that Obama chose to change his speech from an airy to concrete one. He needed to talk less about himself and his feel-good proposals and more about the American people and their long list of grievances. He had to ramble on like a traditional Democrat instead of agitating like a post-partisan politician. And he was required to use his legendary charisma and prolific oratorical skills to specifically lay out his political vision rather than to just deliver another reverberating speech. The sentences did not have to stick. They just needed to reassure.
Critics may claim that his acceptance speech raises doubts about whether he really will deliver on the transformative politics that he promises and inspires. A boring speech also risks thinning the swarming crowd of feisty rank and file campaign volunteers and new voters that are so crucial to the success of his campaign. But voters already know the inspirational and transformative Barack Obama of “yes we can.” So it can’t hurt that the half-black, first term senator with a funny name has finally chosen to inject some constancy into a campaign that has promised far too much change. After all, everyone knows that Obama has a dream. They just want to hear enough about it to know if they can sleep soundly at night when he is president.
Prashanth Parameswaran’s column appears Wednesdays in The Cavailer Daily. He can be reached at p.parameswaran@cavalierdaily.com.

It’s the picture of freedom in its most rebellious state: Evan Rachel Wood and Nikki Reed pose on the cover of the movie “Thirteen” displaying suggestive tongue rings. OK, let’s get real. You’re at U.Va now, so that probably means that you were far too busy with the science fair at age 13 for a life of not above-the-influence sin.
But now that you’re here, why not go out and get pierced and play the fun game of “how do I hide this from Mom and Dad” every time you go home? There are a couple of reasons not to, depending on the inconspicuous location you choose. While piercings can provide your body with extra flare, there are certain risks associated with them.
Location one: The tongue. You know what they say about girls with tongue rings? Nothing. Everyone is too busy looking at their chipped teeth. Or, in the case of one young woman as reported by the Academy of General Dentistry, a second tongue — the woman found a massive lump growing adjacent to her piercing. While it was not harming her in any way, it was strange and it was growing. Ellis Neiburger, who conducted the study, recommended, according to Medical News Today, that if you must have your tongue pierced, you should wear a shorter bar so this type of scar tissue doesn’t form. He also recommended plastic balls capping off the tongue ring, rather than metal ones.
Location two: The lip. Sure, it looks cute on Tom DeLonge. But you aren’t his dentist. Ask anyone in the dental profession, and they’ll have you know that lip rings create gum recession by irritating your gums. Your gums creep down, exposing more of your teeth and getting closer to the root — making your teeth more sensitive and susceptible to cavities. A study conducted by Dr. Dimitris Tatakis found that 40 percent of people with piercings experienced gum recession, while only 7 percent of people without piercings experienced it. One thing you can do if your lip is pierced is switch to a shorter bar so less of your bling protrudes onto your gum.
Location three: The nipple. I am still unsure of the reasoning behind this one, but they are as prevalent on the Jersey shore as family-owned pizza joints. Risks include nerve damage, hematoma, nipple cysts, keloid scarring and more. Women with nipple piercings sometimes fear that they have cancerous lumps in their breasts, but that is probably just hardening around the piercing in reaction to the metal.
Location four: The navel. Although I vowed never to have one of these after a girl in my class told the story of how her belly-button ring got caught in the ring of her binder, it is a very popular piercing in the United States. It takes about six months to heal, and if you’re not going to clean it, don’t do it. It is also a piercing — similar to an eyebrow ring — that is associated with rejection caused by the pressure created by an improper piercing. Rejection is rare if a piercing is done professionally.
Location five: The genitalia. For men, the most popular one is the Prince Albert. They say boys shouldn’t cry, but I suppose this piercing is the one exception we’ll allow. During the first couple days of the healing process, it is actually normal to urinate and dribble blood from the penis. If a PA wearer decides to downsize or remove his piercing, he could experience two streams of urine (a fun party trick). Most men with this piercing report that it enhances sexual pleasure for both partners.
For women, the clitoral hood piercing is one of the more common genital piercings. Despite what you may have heard in urban legends, these do not cause spontaneous orgasms throughout your day. One risk associated with this and all genital piercings is that the fresh wound makes you more susceptible to STIs during intercourse.
While piercings are a decorative tradition that has been around for centuries, they carry a variety of risks that are often overlooked in the heat of rebellion. So before you decide to go out and anger your parents, make sure you’re prepared for the potential consequences.

You wake up in bed — possibly in someone else’s bed — and realize what happened. You had unprotected sex last night. Maybe you were drinking, or maybe it just seemed like a good idea at the time. Whatever the reason, you have to act — and fast, especially if you’re a girl.
So what should you do first? The objective here is to give you a mental map of the steps to take when you’ve engaged in high-risk sex and need to protect yourself from its possible consequences. For the purposes of this installment, I’m assuming heterosexual, vaginal intercourse. If you have engaged in other types of sex, including oral, anal, homosexual or any combination thereof, you are still at risk for sexually transmitted infections, or STIs. In fact, your risk may even be increased, especially if you are participating in anal sex, so read on. And if you’re really a model citizen, you should cut this column out and put it up on your fridge (one of your roommates might need it just as much as you do).
The first thing you need to do is assess the risks involved. If you’re a female and you had sex without a condom, you’re going to need to worry about pregnancy and STIs. (If you are using an alternative type of birth control, your main concern is STIs, as long as you are using the birth control correctly). If you’re a male, you will primarily be concerned about STIs, but you should also stop to ask yourself if your partner could be pregnant.
If you’re worried about pregnancy — and would rather not be pregnant — act fast. Really fast! The first thing to do is call Student Health, which offers non-directive pregnancy counseling, as well as emergency contraception, sometimes referred to as EC or Plan B. If you don’t want counseling, Plan B is available at Student Health without a prescription to males and females who are over 18 if they present a government-issued ID. If you are under 18, you will need to visit Student Health or another medical care provider to obtain a prescription. The cost is $27. This is more expensive than regular birth control use and has some side effects, so don’t rely upon it as your birth control method!
Plan B consists of a high dosage of the hormones found in some types of birth control pills. It works by preventing the release of an egg from the ovary. In the case that an egg has already been released (depending upon where you are in your cycle), it works either by preventing fertilization of the egg or making it impossible for the egg to implant. Once you are pregnant, however, Plan B will not work. This is why expediency is key. Plan B is more effective the sooner you take it, and is most effective if taken within three days after intercourse, although Student Health will administer Plan B up to five days after intercourse. It is not an abortion, since it has no effect on a previously implanted egg.
STIs require prompt action, but they cannot be addressed so immediately because it takes longer for STIs to show up positive in testing. To address the risk, you should call Student Health or another medical care provider for counseling. They will determine those diseases for which you are at risk, then set up appointments in the coming days and weeks to test you. It is important to note that you cannot go in and just ask to get tested for “everything.” It’s not medically possible — they will talk to you and customize testing and treatment for your particular needs.
If you did use a condom, that’s great. It’s important to note, however, that any sex carries some amount of risk, even if you’re using a condom. This is because some STIs, such as HPV and herpes, can be transmitted by skin-to-skin contact by areas of the skin that aren’t covered by the condom. So while a condom is really your best choice if you choose to engage in sex, know that though you’re at lower risk for STIs, you aren’t completely safe.
You’ve all heard before that the only 100-percent safe method is abstinence. But since many college students do choose to have sex, two guidelines can really help cut your risk of contracting an STI or becoming pregnant. First, try to avoid having sex if you’ve been drinking. Drinking lowers the level of judgment you can employ in making wise sexual decisions, and besides, it’s just not as much fun. This is because bodily sensations are dampened when your blood alcohol content is high. Secondly, try to limit the number of sexual partners you have. Be picky. The fewer partners you have, the lesser risk you run of contracting an STI.
If you’re having sex, you should be tested annually for STIs, whether you think are putting yourself in risky situations or not. It’s always possible that your partner has been putting him/herself in risky situations, and even if they’ve tested negative since their last partner, it is possible that an STI just hasn’t yet manifested itself in test results.
Finally, if you want to further educate yourself about safe sex before you go out there and have some nighttime romps, you can make an appointment with a peer health educator, who would love to talk to you about STIs, risks and safer sex practices. Be wise and think about your decisions before you act. But in the case that you do find yourself in a sticky situation, you can be prepared to handle it.
And remember: If you find you need help after traditional work hours, Student Health and other agencies offer help at all times of day by phone.
Andrenne is a fourth-year College student. She can be reached at a.alsum@cavalierdaily.com.

If you’re anything like the 34.2 million Americans who tuned into the Opening Ceremony of the Beijing Olympics, you probably spent the last few weeks glued to the TV watching athletes dive, jump, spike and run. Although cheering for Michael Phelps when he won the 100-fly by a hundredth of a second or gawking as Nastia Liukin as she performed a near-perfect balance beam routine may have made for an exciting end to the summer, few University students’ Olympics experiences can compare to that of first-year student Yolanda Yixiao Min.
Min, a native of Nanjing, China, did not only watch the Olympics in her home country: She marched more than 50 meters through the streets of Beijing with the Olympic torch held aloft in her hand.
“The distance [was] really short,” Min said. “But [it was] the most meaningful running of my life.”
Min, who attended Chaoyang Foreign Language School in Beijing, was nominated to be a torchbearer by the Beijing Educational Committee for her academic excellence and involvement in extracurricular activities. In particular, Min’s involvement with the Green Olympics was a significant factor in her selection. Green Olympics was one of three themes for the Beijing Olympics, along with Humanistic and Hi-Tech Olympics.
According to the official Web site of the Beijing 2008 games, Green Olympics was designed to help China “prepare Olympic Games in accordance with the principle of sustainable development, which calls for the protection of environment, conservation of resources and maintenance of ecological balance,” as well as to “raise public awareness and leave rich environmental heritage for both China and the world.”
These issues are crucial, Min said.
“Green Olympics … means building a greener city and a more environmental-friendly society to welcome the Games,” she said.
Her interest in environmental awareness grew out of a field study she conducted in inner Mongolia about grassland degradation and its influence on social and ecological development.
“We cannot make better living conditions with [the current] environmental crises, nor can we endure a truly economic development unless we figure out how to seek the balance between making development and protecting the environment,” Min said. “I’m not a policy-maker, just an ordinary student, but I can still use my knowledge to do something for the community around us.”
Min submitted an essay to the Beijing Committee following her nomination that detailed her interest and efforts in this area. In fall 2007, she was informed that she had been selected as a torchbearer. Min said she was “almost crazy” with excitement.
“I suddenly [realized] that it’s such a huge honor for me,” she said.
As the Games grew near, Min underwent what she described as very “simple but important” training, including how to carry the torch in the correct manner and how to pass it to the next bearer.
Two days before the official Aug. 8 opening of the Beijing Games, Min became a part of the longest torch relay since the tradition started in Berlin in 1936. Under the theme “Journey of Harmony,” the torch traveled for 129 days and across more than 137,000 kilometers on six continents.
“I never imagined that I [would be] carrying a flame which was collected from the ancient temple in Athens and which can join the world’s attention together,” Min said. “That’s a magic power.”
Aside from carrying the torch, Min also attended many of the Olympic events in Beijing. She saw tennis, swimming, gymnastics and diving, and said she loved them all. In regards to her opinion of the Olympics, “I am really proud of my country and my city,” she said. “People there did a wonderful job.”
Although she has not yet chosen a major, Min is contemplating a double major in environmental science and international relations.
Min said she fell in love with Grounds when she visited last spring, and she is excited about what the University has to offer.
“I’m pretty sure this is the place that can provide me the best four years of my life,” Min said.
Reflecting on her experience as an Olympic torchbearer, Min said carrying the torch was a dream come true.
“For me, the most important thing I took away from this experience is the passion and friendship that this event encompasses,” Min said. “It’s something about building a brighter world with passion we have, and we walk together toward our shared dream.”

Most of you spent your summers in enjoyable ways: family vacations, lounging in the sun or resetting your sleep cycle back to that of a hibernating bear. Or perhaps you were able to find a job, gaining valuable experience and … actually, probably just experience, in the case of most internships.
As for me, I spent my summer developing another one of my unhealthy obsessions. It all began so innocently; I was looking for a way to keep occupied on my commute to work. But before too long, I had become another slave of the crossword puzzle.
A British journalist invented the crossword puzzle in the early 20th century, and despite what your history books may tell you, global productivity has been on a steady decline ever since. If I had money to throw around, I’d invest in the economies of countries whose languages don’t lend themselves to organization in grids. The rest of us are going to be stuck in the dark ages trying to find a five-letter word for “inundate” and praying our pencil lead doesn’t give out.
It’s hard to say what gives these puzzles their addictive quality, but it’s definitely tough to put one down until it’s finished. For one thing, they always seem to be deceptively brief undertakings — the total amount of writing involved is around 200 letters. For us college students, that’s the work of a few seconds, tops. Many of us have had to take notes from at least one professor whose lecture tempo would be more appropriate at a cattle auction. So when you have five or 10 minutes to kill, it seems like a perfect idea to spread open the ol’ crossword puzzle.
Sadly, these little beasties are rarely, if ever, easy to solve. There are, of course, exceptions; not all puzzle sources are created equal. While the New York Times puzzle is fairly challenging, in other papers you might see clues such as “opposite of north.” But most of the time, I find that I’m required to recall pop culture trivia about obscure foreign-born actors, protagonists of forgotten novels and TV shows that were invented five minutes after the television was. When I form my mental image of a crossword creator huddled over a worktable somewhere, he’s wearing a Lawrence Welk T-shirt.
A crossword solver does improve with practice. This is partly because repeated solving improves mental endurance, but it’s more due to the fact that puzzle masters use the same three and four-letter contrivances to fill those little spaces. These terms may not be well-known to the general public, but I guarantee you that every crossword solver out there knows Boston Bruins great Bobby Orr, novelist Erle Stanley Gardner, that margarine is sometimes called oleo and that the direction from New York to Los Angeles is WSW. The worst is when the puzzle creator just gives up entirely and writes in a clue like “snake’s declaration” so he can plug in “SSS.” Pretty weak stuff in my book.
I’ve decided that the ideal place to do crosswords is in private. There’s something about the crossword that makes everybody want to get involved. When people see you doing the crossword, they immediately assume you couldn’t possibly be capable of finishing it by yourself, for goodness’ sake, and that they must ride to your rescue by reminding you that “Hero in boots” is likely to be “Puss,” or some other equally impressive revelation. This almost always leads to an unpleasant confrontation. It’s also why I never do crosswords on airplanes; that environment is dangerous enough, ever since claiming space in the overhead bins became a matter of life and death.
There’s a crossword puzzle a page or two away in this very newspaper, and I imagine that reading this column has, besides nearly putting you to sleep, given many of you a hankering to solve that bad boy. By all means, go ahead! Solving puzzles is good mental exercise, and if you’re better than I at containing your anger, they can actually be quite soothing. But put the pen away and break out the pencil. College is a time for living life to the full, but there’s no need to be reckless.
Matt’s column runs biweekly Fridays. He can be reached at m.waring@cavalierdaily.com.

Neil Sedaka is wrong. Breaking up isn’t hard to do — at least not with an NBA team.
My divorce from the Dallas Mavericks was quick and painless, a Spears-ian annulment that allowed us to go our separate ways. Every cliché was there: We’ve just grown apart; it’s not you, it’s me, by which I mean it actually is you; I never get to see you, but when I do it just isn’t as much fun anymore.
It started as nothing serious, a first foray into caring about the NBA. The Mavericks were a novelty team, putting up 120-odd points a game behind a 7-foot German who can shoot the three. Sure, they were known as the ‘allas Mavericks (no D), but dang, they were fun to watch.
Over the years, we shared some laughs: the first playoff appearance in 11 years in 2001, getting rid of Raef LaFrentz, the 2006 NBA Finals. There were also tears: Dirk’s knee, handing the Spurs a playoff series, losing Steve Nash, the 2006 NBA Finals.
Avery Johnson took what we had to the next level. The feisty little floor general from New Orleans, with his squeaky commands yapping from the sideline, finally made the Mavs a D-fearing team. As a disciple of ACC basketball, raised on defense, defense, defense, I could, for the first time, root guilt-free for my Mavs.
Things started heading for the rocks with the six-game implosion against Golden State in the 2007 playoffs. The No. 1 seed, falling to the No. 8? That’s not just losing, that’s failure from top to bottom. For the first time, I saw Nowitzki for what he was: an imported sideshow act who wouldn’t know defense or leadership if it punched him in his oversized jaw.
The Devin Harris trade was really the beginning of the end. Here was the young kid who was the future of the franchise, the tough defender and offensive trigger who had survived a baptism by fire in the Southwest Division. He’d single-handedly wrestled a playoff series away from the Spurs — and in only his second season!
But away he went, hand-in-hand with two years’ worth of first-round draft picks, for overpriced and over-the-hill Jason Kidd. We were all of a sudden banking on the health of Erick Dampier to make any sort of defensive stops in the frontcourt, a gamble of “put it all on red and spin the wheel” proportions.
The coup de grâce, the unforgivable slight, the “saw her with another guy at a romantic French restaurant” moment, was firing Avery. The tension between him and No-heart-zki had been just under the radar for months, a simmering storyline barreling full-speed ahead toward destruction.
It was a conflict bound to happen. In one corner, there was little Avery, an undersized, underappreciated scrapper who had carved out his niche through hustle, playing smart and leading hard. In the other was Dirk, an overpaid, overhyped prima donna with little more worth as a person than his scoring average.
Dismissing Avery was more than just a regime change. It signaled Mark Cuban’s intent to take the team in a different direction, one painstakingly devoid of unified leadership or passion. These new Mavericks are to be the Yankees of the NBA: a team led by a temperamental, filthy-rich owner who will spare no expense to snatch up aging superstars, sacrificing prospects and homegrown talent for the big-ticket names that sell jerseys in the team store.
So, with the separation complete and all ties severed, I’m looking for a rebound. Just a quick fix, someone to hang out with on a Friday night when nothing else is on — but maybe with the potential to turn into something serious. I’ve bounced ideas off some of my friends, and we’ve gotten it down to a few finalists.
There are, of course, the Washington Wizards. They have the upside of being the hometown team, which is also their downside. I’m a geographically confused sports fan, and take some perverse pride in my bizarre allegiances. Agent Zero, as Gilbert Arenas is sometimes known, makes for a compelling central figure, but there’s the guilt factor: an all-offense team that I’d have to stop watching around my dad lest he start railing against the no-defense ills of the NBA.
“What about the Cavaliers?” one friend asked. Bron-Bron is everything a basketball fan could ask for, the absurdly talented superstar who leads by both example and verbal assault. His stellar defensive play in Beijing was a beautiful sight to behold. But I want to root for a team, not a player, a mistake I made when I picked Dallas because of Dirk.
The Magic may be the answer on that front. They’ve got the young stud in Dwight Howard, who is about one year removed from being the most dominant player in the league, and Jameer Nelson is the kind of point guard I’ve been taught to admire. But they have (shudder) J.J. Redick, and though he’ll never play, the wounds are still too fresh from his time at Duke.
The sleeper pick in this Fantasy Franchise Draft may well be the Phoenix Suns. Whoever has Sean Singletary at least has to be in the conversation, even if he’s going to be a backup. But there might be just enough Dallas left in me to keep me from turning the corner and rooting for a one-time rival.
I guess I’m playing the field, casting out my sports fan net to find another fish in the sea. Suggestions are welcome. Send me an e-mail to support your favorite team (or talk me away from your least favorite). Any particularly convincing, creative or just plain funny arguments may find their way into this space in the future.

The Virginia women’s field hockey team, currently No. 11 in the nation, is looking to make its third consecutive trip to the NCAA Tournament despite fielding a very young team this season Luckily for the Cavaliers, two talented first years, midfielder Paige Selenski and midfielder/defender Michelle Vittese are already making a big impact.
Both Vittese and Selenski are seasoned beyond their years because of their experience in national and international competition. Both players were Junior Olympians in 2005, Vittese winning gold, and in 2007, Selenski and Vittese were both members of the US U-21 National Squad. This fall they will compete for the United States at the Pan American Games in Mexico City as a part of the Junior National Team. The added experience is no doubt making the difference as the two freshmen make the transition to collegiate field hockey.
“I’ve been playing at this level for a little while; Paige and I both have been playing at this level,” Vittese said, “playing against Argentinian girls that are 10 times better than girls from Providence.”
Vittese is a two-time participant in the Futures Elite program and competed at the Junior National Camp twice. Selenski was thrice a member of the national U16 team, and was named the Pennsylvania AA and Overall State Player of the Year in 2007.
This past weekend, both freshmen made their presence known on the field during home matchups against Providence and William and Mary. Selenski scored one goal in the Cavaliers’ 4-1 victory against Providence and notched one goal in the 5-0 win against William & Mary. Vittese added an assist and a goal in the Providence game. For her efforts, womensfieldhockey.com named Vittese its National Rookie of the Week.
The statistics speak for themselves.
“I am adjusting to [the system] pretty well and I think it’s really going to work playing against harder teams and more competitive teams throughout the season,” Selenski said.
Virginia coach Michele Madison’s system of play requires players to step up and challenge the ball with the knowledge that their teammates will fall in behind to cover.
“The more we play it, the more it works, the more we want to play it,” Vittese said. “When someone steps up everyone has to step up behind them, and if we don’t do that then it doesn’t work. When it works it’s really fun.”
Success for this young Cavalier team depends on the ability of its younger players to rise to the challenge right away. So far, the team seems satisfied with its newest players’ efforts
“They have stepped up and made everyone else step up too,” senior midfielder Lucy Meyers said.
As the team continues to grow, both Vittese and Selenski already have their sights set on the NCAA Championship.
“We want to go all the way as always, but we will see,” Vittese said. “We want to get better as a team and get closer and closer, because the closer we mesh, the better we will play together, we will trust each other more and rely on each other.”

I’m sure most college sports fans can tell you what George Mason did in 2006: It made an unlikely run to the Final Four. And it’s pretty common knowledge what Boise State did in 2007 to get its athletic program into the national spotlight: It came back to upset Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl with a few trick plays.
But those two schools can eat their hearts out. When Fresno State won the College World Series this year, it blew those other two upsets — and any other impressive upsets of recent years — out of the water. When the Bulldogs finished off Georgia 6-1 to secure the national title, it was the greatest upset since … well, I can’t really come up with a valid comparison. It’s truly one of the biggest Cinderella stories in the history of college athletics. I’m going to go out on a limb and call it the upset of the century.
“Write it down. Underdog does not mean anything,” Tommy Mendonca, a Fresno State third baseman, told ESPN after his team won the championship. “We showed anything can happen.”
Fresno State began the season ranked in the top 25 before dropping 12 of its first 20 games of the season. At that point, the school was barely considered a factor in its conference, let alone a contender for the national title. Fresno State predicting it would win the national championship then would have been roughly equivalent to Al Groh claiming Virginia’s football team would win the national championship in the press conference after last weekend’s USC game.
When the regular season ended, Fresno State had a measly 33-27 record. That’s middle of the pack — and in a mid-major conference. Fresno State had no chance at an at-large berth in the 64-spot NCAA Tournament, so nothing short of winning the conference tournament could have kept the team alive. Fortunately for the Bulldogs, and people everywhere who love to see David topple Goliath, the Bulldogs survived the WAC Tournament and headed to nationals.
The NCAA Tournament seeds were announced, and Fresno State was handed a fourth seed in its region. This ranking is the equal to being seeded between 13th and 16th in the NCAA Tournament for basketball. Remember that George Mason got all that coverage from being a 10 seed.
The Bulldogs’ run once the tournament started was nothing short of miraculous. They began with a win against No. 3 national seed Arizona State and then took on No. 6 Rice, winning decisively 17-5. The Bulldogs held on to beat No. 2 North Carolina in the semifinals and finally took the championship win against No. 8 Georgia. A run like that is unprecedented.
The whole event is somewhat paradigm-shifting. Who says a third-party candidate won’t win the presidential election this fall? Who says you can’t pull up that D to an A in the last two weeks of the semester? Remember Fresno State. Write it down. Underdog does not mean anything.
If I still haven’t convinced you that Fresno State winning the College World Series is the upset of the century, here’s a fact: No team seeded outside of the top 48 teams, besides Fresno State, has ever made it to a Final Four in any sport in NCAA history. Fresno State not only made it there, it won it all.
“They’re a true champion, and they did it the hard way,” Georgia coach David Perno, whose team fell to Fresno State in the finals, told ESPN. No kidding, coach.
For any team, surviving 10 conference and national tournament matches against teams ranked in the top 20 in the nation would be a huge challenge. That a team barely considered worthy to be in the NCAA Tournament pulled it off is simply astonishing.
I started following the Bulldogs when I heard about them making it to the national semifinals. I watched as the Bulldogs topped Georgia to secure the title. The next morning, as I searched the Washington Post’s sports section, Fresno State’s victory barely received a mention on page two of the section. It’s sad, really, that the upset of the century didn’t receive more love from the press. I’m sure there a few underdogs out there who could have used some inspiration.
Next time you feel like the odds are against you and the man is on your back bugging you, think of the Bulldogs. Think of what it must have felt like to be given the lowest seed in a tournament, not given a chance by so-called experts to win it. Remember the upset of the century. And then, write it down: Underdog does not mean anything.